


blind alley

by artmakira



Category: Ib (Video Game), 文豪ストレイドッグス | Bungou Stray Dogs
Genre: -Ish, Atsushi and Kyouka are siblings and they get swallowed by a living gallery, Atsushi has a Shriek Counter, Basically, Dazai is a Hopeless Adult tm, Gen, Horror, Ib the game au, Ib!AU, living paintings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-20
Updated: 2019-01-20
Packaged: 2019-10-12 06:14:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,115
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17462132
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/artmakira/pseuds/artmakira
Summary: He’s eight years old and he wants to see the world after being caged in an orphanage for so long. Dark corridors and an absence of love and warmth and safety, so much alike to the one he’s running through right now, small feet taking him as fast as they can in an attempt to escape from the monsters that had somehow escaped his dreams to wander around in reality.Atsushi is eight and Kyouka is six and now he’s lost her because he wasn’t strong enough to keep her with him.It’s his fault.(Atsushi visits a travelling art gallery with his new family. It's, apparently, alive and he finds out the hard way when the Underground Fish swallowed him. He panics, rushes to look for Kyouka but finds a man in blue instead.)





	blind alley

**Author's Note:**

> This Happened.
> 
> Somehow--

“Hello?”

His voice bounces through the dark corridors in a series of haunting echoes; _hello, hello, hello._ Atsushi clutches the red rose in his hand, ignoring the pricks of pain caused by the flower’s sharp thorns. He trudges cautiously past framed insects. Atsushi shrieks as a black hand reaches out to him, bursting from the wall so suddenly he could only scramble back blindly away from the ghostly limb. Another one burst forth again, disembodied groans accompanying his screams. It grabs at him, waving wildly to pull free from its perch.

Atsushi climbs to his feet hastily, heading towards the only way he can see as his vision tunnels. More hands burst from the wall, more and more and more. It’s endless and he can’t get out of here, _he can’t get out._

They should’ve stayed. Shouldn’t have wandered of away from Yosano. Should’ve stayed close to Kunikida. But they were so, so _curious._

He’s eight years old and he wants to see the world after being caged in an orphanage for so long. Dark corridors and an absence of love and warmth and safety, so much alike to the one he’s running through right now, small feet taking him as fast as they can in an attempt to escape from the monsters that had somehow escaped his dreams to wander around in reality.

Atsushi is eight and Kyouka is six and now he’s lost her because he wasn’t strong enough to keep her with him.

It’s his fault.

The boy sobs, sliding down the wall after he turns a corner, small chest heaving from lack of air. He tightens his grip on the rose and decides, that, if he can’t find Kyouka, if he can’t escape with her then he might as well give up here.

\-- _but he wants to see his family, wants to celebrate Kyouka’s birthday with everyone, wants to visit the cat café with Fukuzawa-san, he wants to go back_.

“Hey, you.” A squeaky voice breaks him out of his thoughts. Atsushi lifts his head from where he had it tucked in between his arms, finding nothing. He shivers and another strangled sob escapes him. “Hey, you!”

His head jerks up, eyes focusing on the black dot almost lost in a sea of green. “H-hello?” Atsushi whispers, voice raw.

“Yeah, seen my painting around here? It’s handsome like me, a dashing ant.” The black dot, presumably an ant, speaks again. “Better than all those hangin’ over there.”

Atsushi watches the end walk away, renewed determination filling him. If something as small as that can survive in such a scary world, then so can Atsushi. He gingerly shuffles to his feet, slowly inching back to the corridor with the waving hands. He notices how none of the hands were long enough to reach the middle of the path, and cautiously puts his feet forwards. One of the inky black limbs moves, lightning fast, to grab him. Atsushi flinches, squeezing his eyes shut, dread welling up inside him.

 _‘Please, please.’_ He pleads inside his mind.

A minute passes and nothing happens. The limbs keep swinging blindly, none of them coming close to graze Atsushi. The boy heaves out a relieved sigh and continues down his path, carefully avoiding the last hand as he turns a corner. An acid green door immediately catches his attention, and Atsushi, hope and disbelief warring in his eyes, tries for the knob.

It’s locked.

Despair replaces the tentative hope that had been budding in his heart, a horrified wail sticks to his throat as he rattles the knob desperately.

 _‘No, no, no, no, n-’_ His mind keeps repeating in a loop, he shakes the knob harder. When that doesn’t work, Atsushi shoves his shoulder roughly in hopes that the door would give.

It doesn’t.

Panic threatens to overtake him, crashing into him with waves of hopelessness and frustration. He can feel the warmth of tears pricking his eyes.

Atsushi shakes his head. He has to- He has to find Kyouka, he won’t cry, he has to find Kyouka.

Letting go of the knob, he lets his fingers skim the wall, remembering the lessons Kunikida had taught him after he begged his older brother to teach him detective skills. Atsushi has always been a fan of the detective movies Tanizaki always plays every Friday nights during their shared movie time.

 _“If you’re stuck somewhere with no way out, try to look for clues.”_ He remembers Kunikida saying, gently taking his wrist to skim against the walls of their house, similar to what Atsushi is doing now. _“Usually, you’d find ones near picture frames, likes these-”_

 _“That doesn’t happen in real life, Kuni-ki-da!!”_ Yosano had piped in. Atsushi gave her one of his best pouts when Kunikida had stopped, rolling his eyes at the recently graduated doctor.

Yosano ended up joining in and Atsushi will forever be grateful for the lessons, then something sort of a past time, he’d learned. It’s a matter of life and death now, both his and Kyouka’s.

He needs to find her fast.

His fingers catch at the slope underneath a painting of an ant. He gasps, and pushes. The painting gives, rattling out of its place and Atsushi grabs it quickly before it could fall and break.

The boy frowns. What is he supposed to do know?

Atsushi stares at the caricature of an ant. It’s black, like any normal ant should be, painted from the face up so that the back and all six legs are shown. He lets his hands bounce on the sturdy canvas.

Wait.

Atsushi looks back at the corridor he’s dubbed the Hand Hall fearfully. If he recalls correctly, there should be another green door on the other side. He’d tried that one before, only to end up in a room with a gap leading into pitch black darkness in the middle, stretching from one wall to the other. There’s another door at the other side of the gap but with no way to cross it, Atsushi had no other choice but to leave the way he had come in.

Now, maybe, he pushes the canvas harder, with this painting, he could—

Atsushi dashes past the Hand Hall, excitement and adrenaline surging through his veins. If he could, if he could cross the gap and get to the other side—

He turns the corner hurriedly, nearly squishing the small ant from before and burst through the door, slamming it shut behind him.

Taking in deep breaths to fulfill his lungs’ demand for air, Atsushi steps forward and places the picture down on top of the gap. It’s just the perfect fit that the ends hold, not too short that Atsushi would fear it toppling down and bringing him with it.

He gingerly puts his feet down, testing the way the material holds and pushes the other feet in front. One, two, three, four, five—It takes him five fully stretched steps to get across. He wouldn’t have been able to jump across, and he’s _very_ glad he didn’t try _that._

Sighing, Atsushi steps away from the painting, and turns the knob of yet _another_ door.

This one leads him to a corridor eerily similar to the one from before, with paintings of a… of a caterpillar and butterflies hanging on the wall, instead of the various bugs from before. He squints at the words hung under the paintings, recognizing a few but giving up when he sees something he doesn’t understand.

“Me-tamor-morpho-fo-sis?” Atsushi stumbles through the words, shrugging, he could ask Kunikida, later if he gets out.

No, _when_ he gets out.

He shivers.

Walking further forward takes him to a dead end, a single, headless statues clad in a red suit the only thing he can see other than green, green, green. Atsushi bites his lips, inching forward carefully. He tucks the white rose in between his lips and slowly places his hands on the scratchy fabric of the jacket. He flaps the ends, and something shiny falls out of the pockets, hitting the ground with a loud, _twink._

Atsushi looks down.

It’s a key.

He grabs the metal, staring at it in awe. It’s small, with a looped end and another, sharper, thinner end with bumps on it. Atsushi’s finger play with the looped end, wincing at how cold it is.

He freezes when something groans ominously.

The statue-

The statue is-

Moving.

It’s moving, the black arm raising and falling, it’s leg taking small, fast steps as it moves away from its pedestal. Atsushi nearly drops the rose in his mouth, but he keeps it shut through sheer will alone, and _bolts_.

Key still in hand, the rose still between his teeth, he runs back the way he comes from pushing the door open with so much strength it crashes into the wall with a deafening _bang_.

He crosses over the painting, faster than he had previously, and it gives under his weight, the canvas rips like bolts of lightning striking the earth and Atsushi leaves the room, never once looking back.

Panting, he stops in front of a lady bug painting, and meets the ant again. “Hey,” It exclaims, drawing Atsushi’s attention from the red statue. “Hey, have you seen my painting? It used to be over there but I can’t seem to find it.”

Guilt fills his stomach, crawling up his throat. “No.” Atsushi croaks, clutching both the rose and the key closer to his chest.

“Okay.” The ant says, somehow thoughtful, and leaves.

Atsushi stares at the spot where if had been. He’s not sure he can do something as nerve wrecking as that again.

 

\---

 

It turns out that he actually can.

After unlocking the green door, it leads him to a room with a wall shaped like the head of a cat. Large, slit-eyes stare at him, and a mouth shaped like that body of a very small fish gaps at him.

He’s not sure what he’s supposed to do, now, but there are two different ways that he could go and Atsushi picks the right. Kunikida has always told him to pick the right way. He ends up in a storage room filled with different statues; some of them look like the head of a man from his history lessons, there were even some that are similar to the headless statue from before. Needless to say, Atsushi avoids those like he avoids the bullies in his school.

Compared to the statues, the bullies feel like nothing, now.

Atsushi shivers again, and starts to look for clues, hunching his shoulders when the lights start to flicker.

He really, really needs to find Kyouka and get them both out of here.

Something crashes loudly when he turns his back, making Atsushi jump in shock, biting his lips to prevent himself from screaming. “Wha- What?” He gasps, turning around to spot the shattered remains of one of the head statues. He inches forward slowly, kicking away sharp ceramic shards with the edge of the boots Kenji had given him for his first birthday with his new family.

They’re his favorite.

A gleam catches his eyes.

Sitting there among the shards is the upper half of a fish.

Atsushi grabs it and immediately shuffles out of the room.

Another trip in another horrifying room, Atsushi feeds the cat-wall both ends of the metal fish, the lower end he found in the left room with covered paintings. He’s had to chase one that looks like a sloppy stick figure as it hides behind the curtains.

Along with other gruesome and terrifying paintings.

Atsushi shudders, and pushes the memory to the back of his mind.

A room with chartreuse walls greet him as he steps into the maw of the cat-wall. It splits into three, one leading to the further down the hall and the other two to the left and right. Atsushi avoids the left route, turning right because the painting of a scribbled, melting red face scares him. Words in, what looks to be, yellow paint catches his attention. He moves closer and reads them aloud, “B—beware of the lips…?”

Atsushi stares at the red lips drawn a little further away from him and decides to take the last route instead.

 _Another_ black hand burst from the wall and he nearly shrieks, again.

The route splits further ahead, and the right hall is filled with dolls hung upside down by their feet. He takes one look at it and decides that the ominous door on the left hallway is the lesser evil.

He regrets it instantly when he’s faced with different coloured paintings; six black figures, each clad in their own solid colour; five of them liars and one, truth. Atsushi steps in. With only one life; his own, the rose, faced against instant death if he so much as makes a single mistake, he braves the unknown.

 

\---

 

 _‘Blue,’_ Atsushi thinks. _‘Blue is four.’_

He places the tile with the answer, the truth of the six paintings, back into place. Heaving a sigh at the near-death he’s experienced multiple times. Red’s a liar, and so is white. Only the brown painting speaks the truth.

He jumps when a series of slashing noise and a screech is heard from outside the tilled room –the room where the six paintings hang. Gulping, Atsushi pushes the door open, holds in a scream when he sees red liquid dripping down the brown painting’s ruined form. Glancing around the room reveals the other faceless figures in the painting holding various types of harmful weapons; a knife; a dagger; a mallet. Chills run down his spine at the echoing screams of _LIAR LIAR LIAR._

Atsushi rushes out of the room as fast as his little, booted feet could carry him. With his hands clamped over his ears, the rose’s thorns scratch his face and pulls at his hair.

The boy sucks in a startled breath when he bumps into something soft and… scratchy. It’s the hanging doll, nearly as big as Atsushi with button eyes and a stitched smile. Dressed in green pants and a loose red shirt, it’s stomach looks like it’s been ripped and stitched again. Atsushi pulls his hand back when it brushes against stringy brown locks of hair, shaking it rapidly as his expressions twist into horrified disgust.

A dull thump sounds from somewhere beside him.

The other red doll seems to have fallen, laying on the floor in an unnatural twist of limb and torso. It reminds Atsushi of the time someone accidentally ran over a cat. He inches towards it slowly, lifting up the red shirt to find a green number eighteen.

“So, blue is four and green is eighteen?” Atsushi ponders aloud. “I wonder what these are for…” There was also the red number from the white painting down the hall. He hated the spit monster, but whatever feeling had urged him to trust the brown painting had also lead him past the scribbled, melting face to squint at a pure white picture when he was wandering around, confused about the tiled room and which painting he could trust.

It had a red number nine, in it.

Atsushi ventures further down the hall, coming to a stop in front of a yellow door. It’s a cheery, inviting kind of yellow but with how this whole twisted version of an art gallery had treated him, he’s not going to start trusting yellow door.

Especially not when the black figure with a yellow dress, one of the liars among the six, had almost gotten him killed via a lie and a poisonous cloud of gas to his face.

There’s a note beside the doorknob.

A green X symbol, multiplied to a red X and added to a blue X.

 _‘X x X + X.’_ Atsushi scratches his chin. “ Green is… eighteen… so eighteen multiplied to nine and added to four…” He counts his fingers, teeth sinking lightly into his lips. _‘Oh no… this is hard… Kunikida said to always multiple before adding.’_ He thinks, remembering the words of his brother, who’s been working as a math teacher for a prestigious university for years.

“So… A hundred and sixty-six?”

The door unlocks with a click.

“Oh…” Atsushi breathes out slowly, pushing the yellow door reveals a room filled with life-like trees. A brief touch tells him that the trees are sculpted and not real. Atsushi doesn’t quite know why but that knowledge brings with it a sense of relief. He eyes the single apple hanging on to the branch of the tallest tree, standing in the middle of the room. Even that one only goes a few inches taller than Atsushi, as he reaches for the wooden apple easily, plucking it from the green foliage.

He bounces the apple between his hands.

‘What do I do with this?’ Atsushi wonders, part of him knows that the only place he hasn’t explored yet are the lips, but the yellow writings had told him not too. He glances the hall leading towards the lips hesitantly and decides against it, walking back out to the cat-wall room instead.

Hours of searching turns fruitless, Atsushi grimaces as he faces the lips. He has no other choice but to go against the one thing the sighs had warned him not too, because there is no other way. Atsushi bites his lips, and tosses the apple to the lips on the wall. Its mouth opens to take in the apple, crunching it up so loud that Atsushi has to block his ears to dull the sound. He sobs because this is _scary_ but he has to do it, he has to find Kyouka because it’s his _fault._

The mouth stops chewing, a giant red tongue coming to lick its lips.

“Come.” It says, mouth stretching so wide it would be able to swallow Atsushi in a single bite.

Atsushi gulps, swallows his tears and braves the dark.

 

\---

 

 _‘I hate it.’_ He thinks as a guillotine crashes down on him, nearly cutting him in half and, not for the first time, he wishes he has someone to accompany him through the nightmares.

 

\---

 

Standing before a painting of a man dressed in a maroon suit, eyes closed in a way that his lashes brush against pale cheeks, Atsushi can only stare at awe. It feels like a respite from all the horror he’s had to face today. The man in the painting is… really pretty, Atsushi muses, or as Yosano would say ‘gorgeous’ though Atsushi doesn’t quite know what that means. He skims his hand on the golden frame, reading the words etched on to the gold plate under the painting aloud.

“The Man in Red…” There is a name beside the description, but the kanji is complicated, something he’s never seen before-

_Crash._

Sharp black nails reach out towards him, clawing at Atsushi’s white dress shirt as the man comes to life in a burst of red sparks and crystal shards. Atsushi shrieks and pulls himself free from the painting’s hands. The man growls at him, eyelids opening to reveal startlingly blue eyes. It is the azure blue of the sky and Atsushi wishes it would swallow him up so that he could return back to his world.

 _‘Not without Kyouka.’_ He swears to himself.

Atsushi scoots backwards as the man dislodges himself from his perch on the wall, crashing down to the floor and scattering more glass shards. Some of them scratches the palms of Atsushi’s hands as he scrambles away from the man, turning tail and rising to his feet.

He runs away from the painting but the man keeps _chasing_ him. Panic rises like an unwanted tide in his chest, seizing his lungs and squeezing his heart. Atsushi rushes to the red door in the middle of the room, rattling the knob as desperately as he had rattled the green door.

It’s locked too and he lets out a choked wail as the man in the painting crawls closer, mouth split into a terrifying grin. Atsushi takes it back, he’s not pretty, the man is _scary_ like the others and he doesn’t want anything to do with it. He’s scared.

He’s _scared-_

Atsushi curls up into a ball at the base of the red door and _cries._

There’s a clatter in the distance, a scraping sound so close that Atsushi flinches hard and curls up into his ball tighter. _‘I’m going to die,’_ he thinks, _‘I’m going to die and no one’s going to know and everyone’s going to forget and I won’t be able to find Kyouka-chan and it’s my fault, it’s all my fault.’_

“I’m sorry,” He says to no one in particular. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry-”

Somethings metal clinks beside him, a whispered, “Here. Go find him.” The scraping fades away and everything goes quiet.

It stays quiet for minutes after that Atsushi feels himself calm enough to lift his head out of the protective circle of arms he’s surrounded himself with. The Man in Red is gone, and the halls are bright, the light glinting eerily on the carpeted red floor. Atsushi takes in a deep breath, looking around cautiously in case the man is still there.

He’s not- he’s not here anymore.

Atsushi heaves out a sigh of relief, exceedingly loud in the silent room. He uncoils from the tightly wound spring that was his body’s posture and reaches shakily for the red key in front of him. It shines brightly, crimson and maroon mixing to form swirling patterns. Atsushi lets his fingers trace over the pattern as he stands, turning to face the red door behind him.

An ominous click follows after he unlocks the door. Pushing it open, Atsushi steps into a room filled with so many books. More than he’s ever seen in his life, even with how much Ranpo, Yosano and Kunikida love to read.

The bookshelves stand in rows of four, two columns on each side of the wall. They’re clean, immaculate even, and Atsushi wonders who would come here every day to clean something like bookshelves, especially with how scary the road to this room had been. He clutches the rose tightly to his chest and inches forward with childish curiosity, grubby fingers lightly caressing the spines of the books.

A thin, colourful book catches his attention when he stops at the top most bookshelf, the second one from the left wall.

“Carrie Careless and the Galette des Rois.” Atsushi reads aloud “Oh- It’s a picture book!!” He exclaims excitedly, finally, something he can make sense of. He turns the page, and the picture start moving in the book. Atsushi stares is it, fascinated, _‘It’s like a movie…’_

_Carrie Careless and the Galette des Rois_

_Happy birthday, three children’s voice echo, shouting the greeting excitedly at the single blue child._

_Thanks guys!! Says Carrie, jumping up and down excitedly._

_For your special day…, a pink child claps her hand, we made a **Galette des Rois**!!!_

_What’s that? Carry asks._

_“There’s a coin in this pie,” The **pink one** explains, “And if you eat the slice with the coin in it… Then you’ll be a happy person!!!”_

_“That sounds like fun!!” Carrie **gasps**._

_“Doesn’t it?” The pink child exclaims, tiny fingers closing around the handle of a large knife “Okay, let’s divide it up!!”_

_“Now, pick the slice you want and let’s eat!!”_

_“Aah!” Carrie shouts, surprised. “I think I just swallowed something hard!!_

_“Ahahahaha!!!” Carrie’s friends laugh. “It must have been the coin!!!”_

_“What do I do?” Carrie worries._

_“It’s fine!! The coin’s small!!” The pink child soothes. “I’ll clean this up now!!”_

_The curtains close._

 

Atsushi blinks out of his stupor, a dazed expression on his face. _‘What was that?’_ He mules, it felt as if voices were speaking in his head, echoing in his mind like a distorted track. He spreads his fingers over the page with closed curtains, frowning, should he continue?

Curiosity wins, and he flips the page.

 

_The curtains open._

_The mother in pink walks back and forth, muttering to herself._

_“What’s wrong mom?” The child in pink asks, the plate with **the knife held carelessly in her right hand**._

_“Have **you seen the keys** to the studies?” The mother asks._

_“To the study?” The pink child echoes. “It’s always right here on the tabl-” The child pauses, spotting a small round object. “Huh, it’s the coin- the coin that should’ve… been put… in the pie…”_

_“Where could it have **gone** …” The mother whispers. “Oh, my dear will be so upset….”_

_The mother leaves the room, the child **staring at her back**._

_“What do I… do…” The child whispers, her arms go weak and the plate droops, the knife clattering to the floor with a loud_

**_ CLANG _ **

Atsushi startles out of his reverie, dread settling into his stomach. He tries to stop his fingers, but the page has been flipped and the story starts again.

 

_The curtains open._

_CLOSES –CLO- **OPENS**_

She **–he** , she, the child in pink ( _the one in white_ ) walks unto the stage, a ** _knife_** clutched in her ( ** _his_** ) hand. “Looks _like I was just as careless **as Carrie**_.” The _child_ giggles and disappears to meet her friend.

_The curtains close._

“ **I FOUND THE KEY, NOW OPEN THE DOOR!** ”

 

“No!” Atsushi screams, throwing the book away from him. He can see the blood on his hands, the blood on his body staining his clothes- He killed Carrie-

He killed his friend to get the key-

He-

He-

The blood is gone and there he sits on the plush red floor, knees pulled up to his chest, shaking so hard he could barely breath. A deafening _click_ cuts through his harsh, labored breathing. Atsushi’s eyes snaps towards the direction of the door and he scrambles up to his feet, moving choppily.

He leaves the room and he doesn’t look back.

 

\---

“E-Eternal blessing?” Atsushi stutters out the name of a painting of a blue vase. It’s a pretty shade of blue, lighter than the colour of the Man in Red’s eyes. He shudders, and turns his attention to a physical version of the blue vase sitting innocently on a small table.

Atsushi bites his lips, releasing the death grip he has on his rose. Where there were originally five petals, there are only three left hanging onto the stem. He stares at the blue vase, peers at the clear, glistening water inside it and decides.

Water is good for plants, right?

He places the rose inside the vase, and it shines brightly, two additional petals growing back to accompany the three as the water disappears from the vase. His body feels light, lighter than he has ever felt since he’s landed in this nightmarish places. Atsushi sucks in a deep breath and he can feel the cool air soothing his lungs.

Taking the rose back, Atsushi heads down the left corridor, emerging in a room eerily drenched in red lights. He walks in slowly, stumbles on uneven ground. There’s another vase, this one empty of water, a few steps away from the hall as the room spreads out to include small steps, another door, and a window beside the door. Several framed writings hang on either side of the vase.

Atsushi ventures further into the room, spotting petals of blue flung _haphazardly_ on the ground. They start near the base of the red door, spreading to a hidden side of the room. There are steps that lead to a bare spot on the wall, oddly free of dust in a square shape, with a small metal plate underneath.

“The Man in Blue… Tachi…?” Atsushi squints at the words, not recognizing the kanji etched on the gold. He comes back the way he came from, tries the door knob, and predictably, its locked.

Atsushi sighs, and backtracks to the hall with the vase painting, absently walking to the right end of the spilt.

 _‘I still haven’t found Kyouka…’_ Atsushi sniffles, playing the petals of his rose. ‘ _What am I going to do no-_ ’

“Ahh-” The boy exclaims as his feet catches onto something soft. He spreads his hand out for balance, nearly flinging his rose away. He feels like a plane as his foot kicks out behind him, a plane wobbling as it is assaulted by thunder and buffeted by strong winds. A plane that crash lands on something very warm and still.

The first thing Atsushi thinks, as he opens his eyes and sees wavy brown hair, feels it brush against his cheeks, is, _‘Soft.’_ The second thing he thinks, not feeling any sort of rise from a chest that is supposed to be breathing is, _‘Oh no, it’s dead.’_

Or not.

The thing underneath him groans, presumably because Atsushi had pushed his hands down on it’s blue, clad back too hard in an effort to scramble away from the thing. Atsushi swallows, immediately standing and moving away from whatever it is that he had fallen on.

It’s a man, Atsushi gasps, once he’s far enough to be able to fully see.

Better yet, an adult, and Atsushi nearly weeps in relief at the fact that he’s finally found an _adult_.

The adult is lying face down, sprawled on the flower like he’d just fallen and given up there. There’s a mop of brown hair that has the boy gasping in awe as he runs his hand through the very fluffy mess, and a face hidden by the angle of the head and the way his hair falls. Atsushi tries his best to comb away the mop with his fingers. He fails and huffs, wanting to know who the stranger is.

A glint to his left catches his eyes.

Atsushi pries the stranger’s loose grip and find a key clutched in between slender fingers. The metal shines in the low light of the hallway, a deep, misty blue.

Atsushi gnaws at his lips guiltily, remembering the blue rose petals scattered on the floor of the other hall. “I- I promise I’ll come back!! I just need to- need to borrow your key for a while, sir!” He stutters, rising to his feet and scampering away to return to where he had seen the fallen petals.

He slips the key into the keyhole, turning the lock. Warily, Atsushi pushes the door open and peers into the small room, spotting the upper body of a man wearing a faded denim jacket. “Oh no…” He whispers to himself, noticing the azure rose clutched in the paintings hand. The Man in Blue tears at its petals viciously, a sadistic smile forever etched on the painting-come-alive’s face. Atsushi whimpers at a particularly rough pull, feeling emphatic pain pulse through his body. It draws the attention of the painting, pulling the horrifying gaze to settle on the young boy.

Or, more specifically, the white rose in Atsushi’s hands.

Atsushi gasps, quickly shutting the door. He places a hand on his chest to calm his furiously beating heart. Atsushi sighs, how is he supposed to help the adult now…?

A crash that sounded much to close for comfort pulls him away from his thoughts. Atsushi’s head snaps to the sound of the noise, finding the Man in Blue smirking at him, surrounded by shards from the mirror it had crashed through.

Oh.

Atsushi bolts, back into the room, hoping against all hope that the painting wouldn’t be able to follow him back in.

It is a miracle, perhaps, that he finds the remnants of, what he assumes to be, the stranger’s rose laying on the ground, discarded and broken.

Atsushi moves to pick the fragile flower into his small hands, delegating his own white rose to a spot in between his teeth. There’s only one petal left, which means the stranger is very close to death. Cradling the rose gently, Atsushi knows what he needs to find.

A vase filled with water.

He steels his courage, turning the knob of the door and dashes out to the spot where he had seen a vase placed in between framed literature. He runs ups the short flight of stairs, the Man in Blue hot on his heels and thanks the Gods that the once empty vase is, somehow, now filled with glistening, clear live-giving liquid.

He places the blue rose inside of the vase, hopping from one feet to another impatiently. Once the petals have grown back, a beautiful deep blue like the open waters of the ocean, Atsushi takes one look at the painting struggling to climb the stairs and bolts back to where the stranger lay.

 

\---

 

The adult is staring at him, gaze an intense, smoldering brown that has Atsushi shrinking into himself, wondering what he had done wrong.

“Well, what do you have to say for yourself?” The stranger demands, crossing his arms over his chest. Atsushi is stuck between the need to gape at the older, or to hang his head in guilty shame. Guilty of what he doesn’t know.

Atsushi’s eyes flicker upwards when the stranger huffs, annoyed. His gaze is immediately drawn to the thick, woolen scarf wrapped around the other’s neck. It’s a deep maroon in colour and, somehow, it doesn’t clash too horribly with the navy coat the man has on. Checking his own clothing –a simple, white short-sleeved button up and black trousers- Atsushi wonders why the man is dressed as if he’s about to face a snowstorm.

The man huffs again, clicking his tongue. “I always come prepared.” The older says, gesturing to himself. “You, on the other hand,” A slender finger pokes Atsushi’s forehead softly. “did not.”

With the man’s words, a chill rushes down the younger’s spine and Atsushi is reminded of how cold the gallery actually is. Adrenaline and fear had replaced his basic senses with nothing but a will to survive, but now, in the presence of an adult, both feelings have melted to give control back to his muted senses.

The chattering of teeth fills the hall as Atsushi trembles, wrapping his arms around himself in an effort to ward off the freezing air.

It’s fruitless, and the boy’s trembling grows in frequency.

Atsushi yelps as something is suddenly dropped on him, chubby fingers brushing woolen fuzz. He lets the material slide down his and into his outstretched arms.

Oh, it’s the scarf.

He looks back up at the man, flabbergasted.

“Well?” The older prompts.

“W-what?”

“What do you have to say for yourself, boy?”

“I-I have a name!” Atsushi exclaims, slightly irked by the man’s need to call him boy. “I’m Atsushi, Nakajima Atsushi!”

“Well then, _Atsushi,”_ The man snarks. “Why must you be such a busy body?” He sticks his tongue out, eyes scrunching up in disgust. “It reminds me too much of a certain someone that I’d rather not be thinking about now.” The rest of the sentence comes out nearly inaudible as the man grumbles to himself.

“A- A _busy body?”_ The younger shrieks incredulously. “You were dying and I saved you!!!”

“And who asked you to do that?” The older raises a mocking eyebrow. “I surely didn’t” He huffs, rolling his eyes.

Atsushi gapes at him.

“But you were dying.” Atsushi gestures wildly pointing to the spot where the man had once lay. _“Dying.”_ He whispers, shocked.

“Yes, I was.” The man licks his lips. “The pain was manageable and it felt, peculiarly, like I was going to sleep. All in all, I’d say it would have been an almost ideal suicide, if only I had a beautiful woman to accompany me to the afterlife.” He sighs dejectedly, shoulders slumped.

_“S-suicide??”_

The older hums noncommittally.

“I-I, you, _suicide?”_ Atsushi splutters, still trying to wrap his mind around the fact that the man, the _adult,_ before him had wanted -and probably still wants- to _commit suicide_ in this nightmarish gallery.

“Oh?” The man perks, before deflating, lips forming a childish pout. “Unfortunately, I don’t accept children, or boys, as a suitable partner.”

Atsushi mouth hangs open wider. “You’re _hopeless.”_ The younger mutters in despair.

“I’ve been told by quite a few people that I am.” The man grins and Atsushi swallows the urge to shriek for the umpteenth time today. The younger pulls his hair, hanging his head. The dark aura surrounding him is so thick it’s practically visible in the dim light of the hallways.

He startles when a pale hand enters his line of sight, small slivers of dusty white bandages peeking from under the coat’s blue sleeve. Atsushi’s eyes snap back up to look at the stranger’s face- there’s an odd smile on the man’s lips, disappearing quickly as he opens his mouth,

“Hello _Atsushi-kun_ , I am Dazai Osamu.”

**Author's Note:**

> Hnrrgghh I'll come back to my multi-chaptered fics.... _soon_.
> 
> MANY THANKS to Maru for being such a great beta ( ,,･ิω･ิ,, ) and listening to my screaming and Atsushi's shrieks.


End file.
